1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a wireless communication device, a wireless communication system including a plurality of wireless communication devices, and a method for selecting a wireless communication route executed by the wireless communication system.
2. Description of the Background Art
Conventionally, there is known a technique in which a wireless communication system including a plurality of wireless communication devices such as wireless LAN (local area network) devices and wireless terminals, in the case where there are a plurality of wireless communication routes that connect a wireless terminal and a wireless LAN device that is connected to an external network, autonomously sets a wireless communication route that satisfies a predetermined condition (see, for example, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2009-218913, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2007-174368, and Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2008-118484).
However, in some cases, conventional techniques as described above are not always able to autonomously set an optimum wireless communication route. The following shows examples of such cases.
In one of the conventional techniques, when there are a plurality of prospective wireless communication routes, each of wireless LAN devices selects, as a connection destination, one of wireless LAN devices present in the vicinity of the wireless LAN device in accordance with the intensity of a radio wave received from the wireless LAN devices, whereby a wireless communication route from a wireless terminal to a wireless LAN device connected to an external network is determined. However, in this technique, since effective velocities among the wireless LAN devices are not taken into consideration, the effective velocity of a wireless communication route structured by connecting wireless LAN devices from which radio waves having large intensities are received is not always the maximum-speed.
In addition, in another one of the conventional techniques, when there are a plurality of prospective wireless communication routes, each of wireless LAN devices selects, as a connection destination, one of wireless LAN devices present in the vicinity of the wireless LAN device in accordance with hop counts about the wireless LAN devices, whereby a wireless communication route from a wireless terminal to a wireless LAN device connected to an external network is determined. However, also in this technique, since effective velocities among the wireless LAN devices are not taken into consideration, the effective velocity of a wireless communication route structured by connecting wireless LAN devices such that the hop count becomes small is not always the maximum-speed.